Nigeria's President Bola Tinubu has been dragged to the Supreme Court for allegedly unlawfully presenting himself for inauguration as President, despite a pending legal action against the conduct of the 2023 presidential poll.
A Constitutional lawyer and presidential candidate in the 2019 general election, Chief Albert Ambrose Owuru dragged Tinubu before the apex court.
He is asking the Apex Court to nullify the inauguration of Tinubu as the winner of the 2023 presidential poll.
Owuru, a Constitutional lawyer, contends that the presidential election which produced Tinubu was an exercise in futility and illegal self-help given his yet-to-be-determined suit against Tinubu and others at the Supreme Court.
The pending Supreme Court suit with No. SC/667/2023 has Chief A.A. Owuru and Hope Democratic Party as Appellants while Respondents are former President Muhammadu Buhari, AGF, INEC, and Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu.
Owuru is arguing that Tinubu’s declaration as President by INEC is an affront to the Supreme Court and the established law by reason of lis pendens, adding that since Tinubu is a party in the pending suit before the Apex Court, he ought not to have presented himself for inauguration in respect of any presidential poll.
Owuru contested the 2019 presidential election on the platform of Hope Democratic Party (HDP) against former President Muhammadu Buhari and claimed to be adjudged winner of the poll against the declaration of Buhari by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC).
His suit seeking an order of Court to declare him as the adjudged and constitutional winner of the 2019 election and currently pending before the Supreme Court was on May 18 this year, voluntarily joined by Tinubu as an interested party.
In a fresh motion on notice served on Tinubu through the Chambers of Chief Wole Olanipekun SAN, the ex-presidential candidate is also praying to the Supreme Court for an order restraining the respondents and particularly Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu from further operating the Federation Account pending the determination and resolution of the constitutional questions again the 2023 election.
In a statement he issued in Abuja alongside a civil group, Hope Africa Foundation in respect of the suit, Owuru contended that since Tinubu had become aware of the suit and had voluntarily joined as an interested party after fierce arguments of his lawyers, he had breached the doctrine of liz pendis and his purported inauguration liable to dismissal.
The statement signed by Anwal Ibrahim, the National Coordinator of Africa Hope Foundation read in part “We want to place on record that Tinubu’s claim to the office of the President is affected by reason of his being Lis Pendens.
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